MELBOURNE United has tuned up for Andrew Bogut’s homecoming by resting several key players and riding a remarkable shooting performance by star guard Casper Ware to a 98-85 road win over Cairns Taipans.
United will host the Melbourne-born former NBA star’s Sydney Kings on Melbourne Cup Eve in what some are calling the biggest regular season game in NBL history.
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Ware’s shooting was like something out of NBA2K, the confident point guard scorching the net on eight of his 12 three-point attempts on his way to 32 points — his 16 in the last quarter, the most in United franchise history.
While the American ignited Melbourne’s offence, coach Dean Vickerman was able to throw a variety of different line-ups at former United assistant Mike Kelly and his bottom-placed Taipans, with a number of stars seeing plenty of bench time as role players like Pete Hooley (20 minutes) filled the void.
Finals MVP Chris Goulding — who passed a fitness test before the game after suffering a knee injury against Perth Wildcats last week — played less than five minutes and could be in some doubt for the Kings’ clash.
Ware, who was leading the league in minutes with 40.6 per game, ran into foul trouble in the first half and scored his points in just 26 minutes.
He is set for Monday’s undercard bout with pint-sized Sydney sparkplug Jerome Randle — even if he’s keeping a lid on it.
“It’s a different night, somebody else might go for 30 or something you know?” he said of his imminent meeting with Randle.
“I’m just going to be ready and try lock in.
“We talked about it earlier, we weren’t good at coming back after a win … so we just got to build on this.”
Rejuvenated David Barlow, who scored a United career high 18 points, said it would be business as usual ahead of the blockbuster.
“All of a sudden, now our attention turns to Sydney — do whatever we can to recover, scout, shootaround — standard procedure, do our best on Monday,” Barlow said.
United opened the game on a 9-0 run — drilling a trio of three-pointers inside 90 seconds — and didn’t look back, finishing an other-worldly 16-26 at 61 per cent from the outside.
Cairns import Melo Trimble played a lone hand for the Taipans with an NBL season-high 34 points.
